smooth, flat shiny coils; and still the head was higher than the
rest; and still the icy cold came nearer and nearer, like Death.

The prince almost fainted: everything seemed to swim; and in one moment
more he would have fallen stiff on the mountain-top, and the white head
would have crawled over him, and the cold coils would have slipped over
him and turned him to stone. And still the thing slipped up, from the
chink under the mountain.

But the prince made a great effort; he moved, and in two steps he was
far away, down in the valley where it was not so very cold.

"Hi!" he shouted, as soon as his tongue could move within his chattering
teeth.

There came a clear, hissing answer, like frozen words dropping round
him:

"Wait till I come down. What do you want?"

Then the white folds began to slide, like melting ice, from the black
hill.

Prince Prigio felt the air getting warmer behind him, and colder in
front of him.

He looked round, and there were the trees beginning to blacken in the
heat, and the grass looking like a sea of fire along the plains; for the
Firedrake was coming!

The prince just took time to shout, "The Firedrake is going to pay you a
visit!" and then he soared to the top of a neighbouring hill, and looked
on at what followed.

[Illustration: Chapter Eleven]

CHAPTER XI.--_The Battle_

IT was an awful sight to behold! When the Remora heard the name of the
Firedrake, his hated enemy, he slipped with wonderful speed from the
cleft of the mountain into the valley. On and on and on he poured over
rock and tree, as if a frozen river could slide downhill; on and on,
till there were miles of him stretching along the valley--miles of the
smooth-ribbed, icy creature, crawling and slipping forwards. The green
trees dropped their leaves as he advanced; the birds fell down dead
from the sky, slain by his frosty breath! But, fast as the Remora stole
forward, the Firedrake came quicker yet, flying and clashing his fiery
wings. At last they were within striking distance; and the Firedrake,
stooping from the air, dashed with his burning horns and flaming feet
slap into the body of the Remora.

Then there rose a steam so dreadful, such a white yet fiery vapour of
heat, that no one who had not the prince's magic glass could have seen
what happened. With horrible grunts and roars the Firedrake tried to
burn his way right through the flat body of the Remora, and to chase him
to his cleft in the